{"id":93613,"date":"2025-01-09T15:03:04","date_gmt":"2025-01-09T20:03:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=93613"},"modified":"2025-01-09T15:03:04","modified_gmt":"2025-01-09T20:03:04","slug":"caleb-ferguson-signs-one-year-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/01\/09\/caleb-ferguson-signs-one-year-contract\/","title":{"rendered":"Pirates Boost Bullpen with One-Year Deal for Left-Handed Reliever"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Pirates have signed left-handed relief pitcher <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/f\/ferguca01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-01-09_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Caleb Ferguson<\/a> to a one-year contract for $3 million. <em>Pittsburgh Post-Gazette<\/em> beat reporter Noah Hiles was first with the news. Alex Stumpf of MLB.com subsequently reported the contract details. The deal is pending a physical.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">The Pirates have signed LHP Caleb Ferguson to a one-year, $3 million contract, per source. <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/_NoahHiles?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@_NoahHiles<\/a> first with the signing<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Alex Stumpf (@AlexJStumpf) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AlexJStumpf\/status\/1877397214596677811?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">January 9, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Pirates Sign Caleb Ferguson<\/h2>\n<p>The Pirates\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/12\/14\/pirates-need-outfielders-bullpen-help\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">need for bullpen help<\/a> has been no secret. Having <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/12\/03\/aroldis-chapman-signs-with-boston-red-sox\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">lost<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/c\/chapmar01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-01-09_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aroldis Chapman<\/a> to the Boston Red Sox, and with no apparent interest in returning free agents <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/b\/beeksja02.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-01-09_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jalen Beeks<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/b\/borucry01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-01-09_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ryan Borucki<\/a> to Pittsburgh, barring further moves one would expect Ferguson to slide into the role of the Pirates&#8217; top left-handed reliever.<\/p>\n<p>In a 2024 season split between the New York Yankees and Houston Astros, Ferguson had a 4.64 ERA, one save, and a 1.491 WHIP. It\u2019s almost as if the Pirates are bringing back Beeks, who had a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/11\/20\/workhorse-jalen-beeks-free-agent\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">4.50 ERA and 1.486 WHIP<\/a> last year. Ferguson has been better, however. Previously, he pitched for the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2018-23, sitting out 2021 with an injury. Ferguson is 19-13 with a 3.68 ERA, six saves, and a 1.330 WHIP in his career.<\/p>\n<p>He was at his best in 2020 and 2022. Combining those two seasons, he had an ERA of 2.19 and a 1.106 WHIP in 58 games. The Pirates obviously would love Ferguson to revert to that form, and at age 28 it\u2019s a realistic possibility.<\/p>\n<p>A deeper dive into the 2024 numbers reveals what likely attracted the Pirates to Ferguson. He registered a strikeout rate of 11.1 per nine innings. Additionally, he held left-handed hitters to a .218\/.354\/.308 slash line. Right-handers hit him to the tune of .277\/.333\/.433. He faced 153 right-handers as opposed to 96 left-handers, indicating he may have been miscast in a role for which he wasn\u2019t suited.<\/p>\n<p>He&#8217;s relied mostly on a four-seam fastball which averaged 93.8 mph in 2024. Ferguson also features a cutter, curveball, sinker, and more rarely, a sweeper. The four-seamer was used 43 percent of the time and was touched up for a .323 BA, .437 wOBA, and .393 BABIP. On the other hand, against the cutter, which he used 26 percent of the time, opponents were able to muster only a .135 BA, .182 wOBA, and .226 BAbip.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo: \u00a9 Orlando Ramirez-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Pirates have signed left-handed relief pitcher Caleb Ferguson to a one-year contract for $3 million. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette beat reporter Noah Hiles was first with the news. Alex Stumpf of MLB.com subsequently reported the contract details. The deal is pending a physical. The Pirates have signed LHP Caleb Ferguson to a one-year, $3 million [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5010,"featured_media":93633,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26,1071],"tags":[209,5208,3351,2146,953],"class_list":["post-93613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pirates","category-mlb","tag-aroldis-chapman","tag-brent-strom","tag-caleb-ferguson","tag-jalen-beeks","tag-ryan-borucki"],"modified_by":"Matt Graves","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5010"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93613"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":93634,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93613\/revisions\/93634"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}